The US Open today announced it’s prize money distribution for their upcoming 2013 event, and the players should be pleased. The tournament will raise prize money levels at least by a whopping 37% over last year for each round. The singles winner will earn a Grand Slam record $2.6 million.

A sign of the times perhaps, the loser in the first round of singles this year will make $32,000 which is $2k more than Jimmy Connors was awarded for his 1976 US Open title. The eight semifinalists will also take home more than Pete Sampras’s $600K for winning in 1996.

You honestly believe an athlete should be making 2.6M for winning one event? We’re all tennis fans in here but dude…come on. These are some ridiculous numbers. I have no issues with fattening up the prize number for the lower rounds but proportionally increasing the $’s for everyone seems crazy. How exactly does this benefit the tennis fan? It is after all the fans that make these guys rich.

The two wrongs make a right argument. Please explain why a tennis player deserves a 37% raise from one year to the next. There are a lot of valuable people out there doing more valuable things than playing tennis and getting a pay cut let alone a 37% pay raise. No doubt that the players fought hard for this one and why wouldn’t they?

You want to get paid like a god then act and play like one. No stupid last minute withdrawals (like Fed did today). I’ll take my 37% pay raise while flipping a bird to the fans who made me rich in the first place. Disgusting.

@SG1: I can understand how you feel and NO: I don’t think a person should win millions for playing a game for 2 weeks. Heck: even Andy Murray said his Wimby cheque was a silly amount. The reason why I said it was peanuts was: when you look at how much the players bring into the game and then look at how much they earn, then clearly they are entitled for a bigger cut. The Market is insane, and yep: it is the fans who end up paying the buck. But surely the players are entitled to a fairer share when it is they who are main reason for generating these crazy figures right? But yep: in a ideal world there would be a fairer, more sane financial setup that suits fans, players etc. But clearly we live in a insane world: when folks are interested in the likes of Kim Kardashian then that is reason enough to come to such a conclusion, let alone the ignorance to poverty, inequality between 1st/3rd world countries etc.

In most pro sports (like the NFL or even the PGA Tour), the monies brought in by the athletes pale in comparison to what the athletes actually make (a scary thought). Tennis isn’t any different.

I’m not blind to the fact that over time, there is an increase in pay. However, the numbers just don’t make sense. From 1996 to 2013, the USO has gone from giving the winner $600K to $2.6M. Is this normal? I don’t know anyone who’s had that kind of pay increase over a 17 year period while effectively doing the same job. Has the cost of living over the past 17 years really quadrupled?

Then you hear the players whine about how long the season is…I don’t like blue clay…doping (aka cheating)…I’ll pull out of this tournament or that one because I’m tired this week or there’s a major next week etc. etc. etc. It’s pathetic. The next time a players starts to whine about anything, I’m tuning them out. Millionaires bitching while making more millions. Don’t want to hear it.